The Cleveland show is cancelled

I'm not certain of that. It's sort of polarized in the show's approach. One day they'll mention the DuMont Network from the 50s, but more often they'll toss in the weekly bleeped-out words plus say ''bitch'' for good measure. Anyhow, I see it as smart people catering to some in the audience who will not get all the humor. Chris and Peter types, but especially Chris types. My hatred of Chris as a character is in the stratosphere....

Oh, I am sure they are extremely well educated but they don't seem to understand that their occasional forays into "very special episode" territory are neither funny nor insightful and, in fact, on a show like this, are even more off putting than on something like "Blossom" or "Different Strokes."

I think one of the first shows to go Very Special was THE FACTS OF LIFE, which was never a great show, yet did a great VSE way back about 1981 or so involving self-defense against would-be rapists. What made it funny AND in character were the key actresses's reactions to hypothetical attack situations. For a public service announcement, it did the job well.

But now in the 2010s we have Mr. Giggety as our new moral compass. It still beats hearing ''Look at me, I'm {whoever} for the 13,864th time. Or playing an entire song just to fill time.

What is the word on McFarlane's Flintstones remake? Is it possible Fox is just axing Cleveland to make room for that? In which case, we're just replacing Black Family Guy with Caveman Family Guy.

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The rub is, most black people didn't like The Cleavland Show, from what I can gather. I once came across a comment in an article about the show Daria that was focused on the one black character in it wishing that she had her own show, instead of something like The Cleavland Show (the article in question is here: On Race, Feminism, and Jodie Landon).

For myself, I've only seen one episode of The Cleavland Show, and all I can say is 'meh'.

I think one of the first shows to go Very Special was THE FACTS OF LIFE, which was never a great show, yet did a great VSE way back about 1981 or so involving self-defense against would-be rapists. What made it funny AND in character were the key actresses's reactions to hypothetical attack situations. For a public service announcement, it did the job well.

But now in the 2010s we have Mr. Giggety as our new moral compass. It still beats hearing ''Look at me, I'm {whoever} for the 13,864th time. Or playing an entire song just to fill time.

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The Facts Of Life wasn't the first to do this at all; the very first ones of this type of episode were in the 1960's, one of them being 'The Shark Affair' from The Man From UNCLE, a few episodes of All In The Family, the abortion episode of Maude, and the episode 'Elegy For A Pig' of Adam 12.

What is the word on McFarlane's Flintstones remake? Is it possible Fox is just axing Cleveland to make room for that? In which case, we're just replacing Black Family Guy with Caveman Family Guy.

Click to expand...

The rub is, most black people didn't like The Cleavland Show, from what I can gather. I once came across a comment in an article about the show Daria that was focused on the one black character in it wishing that she had her own show, instead of something like The Cleavland Show (the article in question is here: On Race, Feminism, and Jodie Landon).

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All I meant when I called The Cleveland Show "Black Family Guy" was that it's Family Guy but with a black lead character. It's actually a common joke, along with calling American Dad "CIA Agent Family Guy" or "Republican Family Guy."

The problem was that when Cleveland was on Family Guy, his schtick was that he was a boring guy. That didn't really change on his own show, although now that he's a lead he has to suddenly become the same kind of imbecile that Peter Griffin and Stan Smith are.

Speaking of Stan Smith, am I the only one who finds the rare moments where he's competent at his job, but kind of a dick, the best ones? I'm thinking of the Bond parodies they've done, as well as a scene here or there on the show where he actually remembers being a CIA agent/assassin and the humor comes from a dad/husband who is literally willing to kill for his family?

Maybe it's just that those moments remind me of two better shows: Archer and the Venture Brothers.

On the issue of American Dad, I really don't see the point to making Roger an alien. At this point, the character could eaily have been a shut-in human with some sort of mental problem (to account for his frequent disguises) and you'd have the same show. Maybe this was more a result of how things developed, Roger's disguise schtick didn't really start until the second season, if I'm remmebering correctly.

And what's the point of Klaus? He never does anything and stories never revolve around him. They should have kept him in the human body in that one episode in the early seasons.

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I don't mind Klaus as sort of a greek chorus/voice of reason who gets ignored because he's a fish. That being said, again, my favorite Klaus thing is in the Bond parodies and he's a human named "Tchotchke Schmear." That name cracks me up for some reason.

I gave up on Family Guy about a year after it was uncancelled. You can only do the whole "Republicans are evil!" stick for so long before it becomes tired and now it's just annoying. The only good things left are the Star Wars parodies as they come and even them are littered with horrible jokes

American Dad, Cleveland Show, Bob's Burgers: gave them all a chance and left after an episode or two. Come to think of it, only thing I watch on FOX now is NASCAR.

Even though I'm one of the board republicans I don't get too worked up over the "republicans are evil" stuff on FG.

My only real complaint about it is that AD was supposed to be the political show and that was even how it was pitched: MacFarlane promised an animated Norman Lear style sitcom about a republican CIA agent who clashed with his liberal daughter. Instead it just became a FG ripoff.

Well, that would presume that manatees are are talented as Norman Lear.

In any event, as I touched on before, if there were going to end up a ripoff I would much have preferred a Venture Brothers or, later, Archer ripoff. For example, that time that Hailey went psycho because it turned out her preschool was actually a CIA sleeper agent program was another one of the series' hight points.